After reading the last entry “Working on Happiness”, one of my readers called me and asked:

What happens if you have an objective, you work on it, and it doesn’t turn out as you wished? It’s so frustrating … what happens to happiness then?

I don’t have all the answers, but I have worked with many people and I have come to the conclusion that what we were told about “ask and you shall receive” falls somewhat short. Asking is just the first step. If you set yourself a definite objective you must always bear in mind that you make decisions from where you stand at that moment and that you normally don’t know what lies ahead of you, what you will need, what you will have to work on, what you will have to solve or sacrifice in order to reach your objective. Making and assuming the decision to “go for it no matter what happens” is just the beginning, many simply drop it there.

Then we realise that as well as the objective and the results we want to reach, we must count on the necessary qualities that we will need to reach those results. What if I decide to be my own boss and work to make it true? Not only will I need an objective and an implementation plan, I will have to develop skills such as self-discipline, determination, work, observation, preparation … and a great deal more qualities I will need to cover the way. In order to reach success I will have to work on 20-30 patterns at least. Sometimes it is more important to ask the Universe for guidance in this sense than the actual results.

For example: A part of me longs for the freedom of being my own boss, having my own business, but there are other parts of me that can be incompatible with such objective, patterns I will discover, work on and re-program so that they may not block the physical manifestation of the circumstances, ideas and help that the Universe affords us when we have a plan. The energy of advance in these plans will be hindered by negative patterns such as fear of failure, fear of success, or a pattern of laziness, or one that makes me too hasty and therefore makes me make too many mistakes so that I have to constantly rectify, or I may lack vision of the future, or I am careless with capital that I must invest, or I chose the wrong collaborators or partners, or I rush into things without a clear idea of what I want to contribute to the company, or I am afraid of risk, or I risk too much without giving it much thought …

It can also be that if we have had several attempts without success because of all those negative patterns, we add what we already think and say about our own capacity as a result of our bad experience, such as: “I’m not good enough, I always botch it up, there’s no point in my trying to do anything, I always end up with people who let me down …”

On top of it, most people try to learn about the rules of society and yes, they are essential for advance, but we must also study the laws of Nature and of the Universe. If we observe Nature and its laws we realise they are fair and balanced, Nature regulates itself. Whereas the laws of men are sometimes fair, but not always. The combination of both is what has mankind confused about what we should do in order to get things right from the start, it is the reason why men don’t understand why the world is the way it is.

By constantly interfering with the laws of Nature and physical manifestation, men end up changing the rules of the game. Thus, according to man’s criteria, in Nature the best is the master. But sometimes, in some human societies, it is stupidity, superficiality, selfishness, pettiness or violence that are most valued, thus removing the best individuals from power and decision-making, simply because the worst are the most valued. The sole responsibility for this lack of balance is man’s value system. The crisis of values we are going through is the result of the inability to value what is really important.

The best we can do is to get to know ourselves and understand which values and talents we need to achieve our objectives. If we set ourselves targets but we are not conscious that we need spiritual and psychological work and tools as well as the physical and material ones, we can be in for a lot of frustration and discouragement. A self-assessment is the mother of all blessings, and putting those blessings at the service of Nature is our duty.

Some people reach happiness and success by chance, sometimes it is only material, sometimes it is only spiritual, but because it is not a conscious happiness it’s unlikely to be long lasting. Those who seek to experience it and share it on all levels -spiritual, mental, emotional and material- have the worthiest possible objective, that of a soul in search of its own fulfilment.

If only we would take some of Nature’s ideas to achieve this, if we finally decided to serve Nature and not exploit it, we would be doing a lot better. Service has a lot to do with our longed for happiness.